National Report

Wire Reports

Published Tuesday, November 25, 2008

Minnesota Senate race still too close

MINNEAPOLIS -- With the U.S. Senate recount still incomplete, attorneys on both sides have already armored up for the next pitched battle: over whether to reexamine thousands of rejected absentee ballots.

With Republican Sen. Norm Coleman clinging to a reed-thin lead over DFL challenger Al Franken -- 180 votes as of Saturday night -- the issue of how and when absentee ballots should be counted has election law experts everywhere closely tracking the Minnesota recount drama.

In a race this tight, the difference could come down to clerical errors on absentee ballots or even a challenge of Minnesota's law governing such ballots.

Charity convicted in terrorism financing trial

DALLAS -- A Muslim charity and five of its former leaders were convicted Monday of funneling millions of dollars to the Palestinian militant group Hamas, finally handing the government a signature victory in its fight against terrorism funding.

U.S. District Judge Jorge A. Solis announced the guilty verdicts on all 108 counts on the eighth day of deliberations in the retrial of the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development, once the nation's largest Muslim charity. It was the biggest terrorism financing case since the attacks of Sept. 11.

The convictions follow the collapse of Holy Land's first trial last year and defeats in other cases the government tried to build.

Bystander dead from NJ church shooting

CLIFTON, N.J. -- A second victim of a weekend church shooting died Monday, leaving one survivor who was in extremely critical condition, authorities said. The estranged wife of the alleged gunman, who remained at large, also died in the attack.

Dennis John Mallosseril, 25, a bystander in the shootings, died of head wounds suffered in Sunday's shooting at St. Thomas Syrian Orthodox Knanaya Church. The search for the suspect, Joseph M. Pallipurath, focused on Georgia, where he has relatives, Passaic County Prosecutor James Avigliano said.

Plenty of takers for basement pile of coal

CLEVELAND -- A ton of coal was just taking up space in the basement of Steve Hronek's 90-year-old house, but to other people it was a treasure.

The knee-high pile of anthracite coal was down there in 1997 when Hronek bought the house, which once was heated with a low-tech coal-burning furnace. He turned to a high-tech solution, offering the coal in an online classified ad to anyone who wanted it. Responses from people looking for fuel started coming within 15 minutes and continued for two days, and people showed up with trucks.

Pow! Suspect clubbed with frozen turkey

RALEIGH, N.C. -- North Carolina authorities say a shopper clubbed an alleged carjacker with a frozen turkey as he tried to steal a woman's car in a grocery store parking lot Sunday.

Police say Fred Louis Ervin, 30, of Raleigh stole money from a gas station before running across the street to a Harris Teeter store. Garner police say he began beating Irene Moorman Bailey while stealing her car. Other shoppers came to her rescue, including one who hit Ervin with the turkey.

Despite serious head injuries, Ervin got away in Bailey's car and hit several other cars as he fled, police said. But police arrested him a short time later.